Author Archives: Rusty Rueff

About Rusty Rueff

Rusty Rueff, author of purposed worKING. Rusty Rueff is the former Chairman Emeritus of The GRAMMY Foundation in Los Angeles. He most recently completed the successful 16 month leadership role as Coordinating National Co-Chair for Technology for Obama (T4O) for the reelection of President Obama and ten-years of Board service and President of the Board of Trustees of the American Conservatory Theater in San Francisco. Corporately, most recently Rueff was the Chief Executive Officer at SNOCAP, Inc. until the acquisition of the company by imeem, Inc. in April 2008. Before joining SNOCAP in 2005, he was Executive Vice President of Human Resources at Electronic Arts (EA) from 1998 until 2005. He was also with the PepsiCo companies for more than ten years, with the Pratt & Whitney division of United Technologies for two years, and in commercial radio as an on-air personality for six years. Rusty holds an M.S. in counseling and a B.A. in radio and television from Purdue University. In 2003 he was named a distinguished Purdue alumnus, and he and his wife, Patti, are the named benefactors of Purdue’s Patti and Rusty Rueff School of Visual and Performing Arts. He is a corporate director of Glassdoor.com and runcoach. He is the co-founder and Executive Committee Member of T4A.org, serves on the Founding Circle of The Centrist Project and a founding Board Member of The GRAMMY Music Education Coalition. He is also the co-author of the book Talent Force: A New Manifesto for the Human Side of Business. Rusty and his wife, Patti, reside in Hillsborough, CA and Charlestown, R.I.

day 152: Silly Questions

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Have you ever been in a meeting where the leader or the facilitator says, “There are no silly questions” to get the group to speak up? Of course, there are no silly questions if we are all committed to learning and there is no one in the room evaluating the knowledge level of people. But, how often is that? There is always someone of a higher level or someone who is sitting in the room leaned back in their chair watching and listening to who says what. So what happens is that we don’t ask the silly questions. We leave the fundamental questions like, “Why do we do it this way?”, “Isn’t there a better way?”, “Who does it better than us so we can learn from them?”, “What does all of this mean?”, or “I just don’t understand what you said, can you please explain it again?”. These are the “silly questions” that don’t get asked but need to be asked, however because of fear of retribution, evaluation or embarrassment we just don’t ask even when we know we should. Work is just not set up right for that so we walk around in the dark or acting like we know the answers to things we don’t. One place I worked, the CFO was very focused on increasing cash flow so he was putting in systems, reporting, measures and incentives to increase cash flow. He was so conversant and knowledgeable on the levers that drove cash flow in the business that he would get going fast and there were others (myself included) who couldn’t keep up. I remember a meeting where a whole bunch of senior people from many functions were there and the CFO was going on and on about what we were going to do to meet our cash flow objectives and in the middle of the meeting he was called out for a moment. As soon as he left the room, someone asked the group, “Do you all understand what he is talking about?”. And to my relief, almost the entire room chimed in with, “I don’t have a clue”. When the CFO came back in the room, the courageous person in the room asked the silly question, “Can you explain this again to us, because we just don’t get it”. After the CFO took a deep breath, and likely made a mental note, he started over and most of us got it the second time around. So, while there are no silly questions, we can feel like there are certainly silly questions that we just don’t ask. It’s interesting that in work and life we are seeking knowledge and wisdom and we don’t know where to go to ask. God tells us that He is one who we can reach to for these answers. In James 1:5 we read; “If you need wisdom, ask our generous God, and He will give it to you. He will not rebuke you for asking.” Today, you may need to ask the silly question and don’t know how to do it for fear of retribution or evaluation. Try going to God first for the wisdom needed on how to get the answers you need. We know that He will not rebuke us and that in the answers we get we will receive the wisdom we so need. To God, there are certainly no silly questions.

Reference: James 1:5 (New Living Testament)